Switzerland wins our Eurostory Best Lyrics Award 2024 – the award for the best annual Eurovision song lyrics.
Nemo wins the award for their lyrics to the song The code, co-written by Linda Dale.
Nemo received the award in Malmö, this week.

Who came second and third?
Second: Italy (Angelina Mango), La noia
Third: The Netherlands (Joost Klein, Maradonnie, Tim Haars), Europapa

Who’s in the jury?
The winner was chosen by an international expert jury of authors, journalists, publishers, songwriters and former Eurovision participants from 16 countries (75% of the votes, list of names below) – as well as the readers of Eurostory.nl (voting through the website, 25% of the votes).

Nemo: ‘This is a journey.’
‘I feel so honored,’ Nemo tells when receiving the award. ‘For me this song incorporates the whole journey I made: the times that weren’t that easy, the times that were absolutely wonderful. It puts it all together, without judgement. To see that reflected with this award, that’s really special. Thank you so much.’

Jury report:
Nemo sings about ‘the code’. That brings to mind cryptography, something you have to decipher. But for Nemo, uncovering what lies behind the code has much more to do with something larger: the limited choices society imposes on them as a genderqueer person. You must be zero or one – computer language for one or the other. In other words: binary. In other words: male or female. Nemo beautifully articulates this in the bridge of their song: ‘Somewhere between the 0’s and 1’s, that’s where I’ve found my kingdom come.’
That last word is an important nuance: their ‘kingdom come,’ not just their ‘kingdom.’ The expectation of a kingdom is thus found, not yet that complete kingdom (articulated by these lines: ‘Let me taste the lows and highs, let me feel that burning fright’). The beauty of this song about non-binary identity is that both the melody and the lyrics are not apologetic, not accusatory, but simply euphoric. And a line like ‘I broke the code like ammonites, I just gave it some time’ is, of course, a brilliant, promising way to describe this life-changing quest. Moreover, how often have ammonites been mentioned in a Eurovision song?

Previous winners of the Eurostory Best Lyrics Award:
2016: Ukraine
2017: France
2018: France
2019: Italy
2021: Italy
2022: Italy
2023: Austria

The expert jury of 2024

Daniëlle Bakhuis (The Netherlands: author)

Elsie Bay (Norway: Melodi Grand Prix participant 2022)

Marius Bear (Switzerland: Eurovision participant 2022)

Hanna Bervoets (The Netherlands: author)

Marko Bošnjak (Croatia: DORA participant 2022)

Biljana Crvenkovska (North-Macedonia: author, publisher)

Kristien Dieltiens (Belgium: author)

Mia Dimšić  (Croatia: Eurovision participant 2022)

Don Duyns (The Netherlands: author)

Fazla (Bosnia and Herzegovina: Eurovision participant 1993)

Niki Francesca (Andorra: Eurovision participant 2007)

Trong Hieu  (Germany / Vietnam: Unser Lied für Liverpool participant 2023)

Vasil Ivanov (Bulgaria: Former Head of Press BNT Eurovision Bulgaria)

Greetje Kauffeld (The Netherlands: Eurovision participant 1961)

Getty Kaspers (The Netherlands: Eurovision participant 1975)

Eyjólfur Kristjánsson (Iceland: Eurovision participant 1991)

Cornald Maas (The Netherlands: author, presenter, Eurovision commentator)

Bart Moeyaert (Belgium: author)

Alexandros Panayi (Cyprus: Eurovision participant 1995, 2000)

Sheldon Riley (Australia: Eurovision participant 2022)

Martin Rombouts (The Netherlands: author, performer)

José Luis Serrano (Spain: author)

Liliane Saint-Pierre (Belgium: Eurovision participant 1987)

Moira Stafrace (Malta: Eurovision participant 1994)

Erik Titusson (Sweden: publisher)

Voyager (Australia: Eurovision participant 2023)

How have we settled the result?
Expert jury members were asked to cast two votes: a number 1 choice (worth 3 points) and a number 2 choice (worth 1 point). The final results were converted into a 12-10-8-6 point distribution, which accounted for 75% of the final score. Website visitors were able to cast 1 vote, and this total score was also converted into 12, 10, 8, and 6 points, which then accounted for 25% of the final score.